Apartment 311
by LaughingSenselessly
Summary: Lydia has decided that she hates her neighbour, and she hasn't even met him yet. But she has heard him. (AU. Stiles and Lydia are neighbours in their apartment building, and the walls are really thin, which means they get to know each other. Whether they want to or not.)


**A/N: HAPPY EARLY BIRTHDAY TO THE AMAZING RACHEL AKA rongasm on tumblr!**

 **Original prompt: "Stiles and Lydia are apartment neighbors who share a bedroom wall and every night they have awesome talks and become really good friends and Stiles has seen Lydia but she doesn't know what he looks like and oops they fall in love"**

 **Completely unbeta'd. Let me live.**

* * *

Lydia has decided that she hates her neighbour, and she hasn't even met him yet.

But she has _heard_ him.

" _Crap_ ," she hears him yelp just now, through the thin wall that separates their apartments. Something hits the floor and smashes presumably into a million pieces, and then Stilinski's voice raises to call through loud and clear: "Sorry, Lydia!"

Lydia simply flops over in her bed, not answering as usual. There's another resounding crash from her neighbour's apartment. She has to wonder how he even has anything left to smash. Her own conclusion had been that he must go out during the day and buy glass ornaments, then take a baseball bat to them when the clock strikes midnight. There's really no other reason that it should happen this frequently— at _least_ once a month. And if he's not smashing things or otherwise emitting odd noises that she can't quite put her finger on, he's got his loud and raucous bunch of friends over.

Lydia's tried complaining numerous times to the landlord, Deaton. Because she's got lectures to present. Papers to write. Things to do. All that fun stuff that comes with moving to your boyfriend's city and moving your whole career over too. But after three weeks, Deaton apparently hasn't gotten around to kicking Stilinski out to the curb, and if it hasn't happened yet— after he's lived here for two years before she ever did— she doubts it ever will.

She curses herself inwardly now, as Stiles yawns loudly through the wall. She _knew_ there had to be a reason this apartment hadn't been snatched up yet, but the price tag had distracted her from asking too many questions. She strongly regrets that now.

As she hears Stilinski finally manage to trip into his own bed and the sounds settle into quietness again, she reasons that she could just move into Jackson's place. He's got a swanky penthouse downtown, but she'd been waiting for him to invite her to do so. He never had. Perhaps the notion hadn't even occurred to him, but Lydia had far too much pride to ask. And Allison, who helped her move into this place, already has three roommates.

So now Lydia's stuck.

—

The next morning has Lydia feeling tired and bleary, something she attributes entirely to the idiot living in apartment three-eleven. She's got an early morning class, so she resigns herself to getting coffee. Not something she likes to do if she can help it, but a good jolt of caffeine appears to be a necessary evil at the moment.

Luckily, there's a coffee shop and bakery right across the street so she heads in there and orders a cappuccino.

The guy at the counter— one with friendly brown eyes and dark hair— delivers her a warm smile that immediately sets her at ease despite her grumpiness. His smile makes it apparent that his jawline is kind of uneven, which she thinks is adorable. "Name?" he asks her, fingers poised with a sharpie against her styrofoam cup.

"Lydia," she replies, and he— Scott, she reads from his name tag— scrawls it down. She casts her gaze around the place in the meantime. It's quaint and small, with squishy, worn couches and warm lighting. The bakery part is in the back, behind the counters, and while she's looking over the pastries on one of the trays debating whether to buy one, she notices one of the chefs peeking over at her.

Not fazed by being checked out, she gives him a dismissive once over in return. He's wearing an apron and is tapping a rolling pin nervously against the table he's working on. He's staring at her rather blatantly. He's cute, she supposes, with an upturned, gently sloping nose and hair that's sticking up haphazardly in every direction.

"It'll be ready in like, two minutes," says the barista, and she blinks before returning her gaze back to him. "Anything else today?"

She shakes her head and when she looks back towards the kitchens, she can't see the chef anymore.

—

Stiles Stilinski is in love with Lydia Martin.

"You've never even met her," Scott points out for the fiftieth time, after Stiles has declared his love for the fiftieth time.

Stiles holds up a hand to silence him. "That's where you're wrong. I met her at work yesterday."

Scott sits up with interest. They're at Scott's place, so Stiles doesn't feel the need to be too quiet. It's not like Lydia can hear. "You talked to her?"

Stiles deflates slightly. "Well, no— I just saw her. God, Scott, she was so freakin' beautiful."

"Why didn't you talk to her?"

"Did you not hear me?" Stiles asks, bracing his hands on the coffee table. "Let me repeat myself. _She was so freakin' beautiful._ "

Scott stares at him like he's dumb. Stiles sighs.

"She's out of my league, Scott. She's got a boyfriend, and he's," he scrunches his face up, bringing both hands up in front of Scott's face for emphasis, " _just_ as sexy as she is. I've seen him come out of her apartment."

"Your guys' doors are on opposite sides of the hall."

Stiles ignores that because he doesn't want to admit he once ran out into the hall and all around the block of apartments to catch a glimpse of the guy his neighbour had been making sex noises with. Curiosity is a powerful drug. "And he's seriously a huge dick."

"Really."

"Yes, Scott, _really_. I'm not just making this up."

—

He's really not.

—

Jackson's mad at Lydia for one stupid thing or another, and today he's positively enraged that she made him late for his lacrosse game.

She'd had a meeting with her professor that ran late that afternoon and, knowing that Jackson was waiting for her outside, she'd run to go meet him.

He snapped at her, of course, because that's what he does, and she huffed at him as she got into his Porsche. She'd barely closed the door before he was flooring it to his lacrosse game.

And then he was late for his lacrosse game, which inevitably pisses him off, but the extent to which it pisses him off isn't clear until later in the evening when he drops her off back at her apartment.

"I didn't do anything," she snorts, taking off her coat.

"You're the one that gave me this cold so I couldn't play on Saturday," he accuses as he roots through her fridge without asking. "You're the one who made me late to play today. How much game time are you going to take from me, Lydia? Huh?"

She resists rolling her eyes at his theatrics. She's not worried. "You're the star player, no one's going to kick you off the team."

Unexpectedly, he slams the fridge shut. It's loud and the thing shudders visibly, and Lydia can't help but jump. When he turns to look at her, his gaze is furious. "Yeah, no thanks to _you_."

She's rooted to the spot.

"If I _do_ get kicked off the team it'll be because of you," Jackson says in a low voice, and Lydia's clenches her teeth and lifts her chin, meeting his unwavering stare.

He turns to walk away, and somehow that feels worse than if he stayed. But then Jackson pauses and whips around suddenly; Lydia flinches.

There's some part of her, deep inside, that loathes the way that Jackson can make her feel. The fact that he has her heart in the palm of his hand means he has the ability to crush it, and lately that's all he's been doing.

He prowls towards her and Lydia finds herself taking steps back until her back hits the wall with a loud thump— Jackson crowds her in where she's got nowhere to go, their chests nearly bumping, and points a finger at her face. "Because you ruin _everything_ ," he snarls.

His words aren't exactly shouted but they ricochet all over the apartment; and although it's a tiny space, it feels like they echo. _You ruin everything_!

 _Everything_!

 _Everything_.

She can't find it in herself to say a single thing. Her heart doesn't feel like it's even beating. It's frozen in terror, and she hates it.

Just then, there's a knock on the wall that makes both of them start.

"Lydia?" It's Stiles. "Lydia, you there?"

Jackson whips her head around to her, eyebrow arching in question. She swallows, trying to speak normally. "What do you want?"

There's a pause. "Flour," Stiles says. "Remember you said I could borrow some flour from you." Lydia had most certainly never done such a thing. "Is this a good time to come over and grab some?"

"Flour," Lydia repeats slowly, painfully aware of Jackson's eyes trained on her. "Yeah, I remember that. But— now's not a good time, I have someone over."

"Oh," Stiles replies, acting perfectly surprised. "Just let me know when you're free, okay? I'm making Star Wars themed cupcakes and I'm running low." She scoffs silently. What a fucking nerd. "And Lydia?"

"Yes?" she calls, now allowing an ounce of irritation into her voice.

His voice changes slightly. She can't quite tell what the difference is, because he still sounds casual on the surface of it, but… there's something else vibrating through his words. "You okay?"

Lydia's unable to stop her eyes from shifting over to Jackson, catching his hard stare before sliding away again. "Fine," she chirps. And then, because Jackson is staring suspiciously, she adds, "Go away."

"Sounds like a fuckin' plan," Stiles mumbles, and then she hears his footsteps retreat.

Jackson takes a step back, anger in his eyes thankfully cooled after the exchange. "Who the hell is that dipstick?" There's clear jealousy in his voice.

Lydia resists making a sarcastic remark. "My neighbour. He's an idiot, but harmless."

Jackson rolls his eyes and goes to grab his jacket from the couch. "Yeah. Whatever. I'm leaving." He makes for the door, pauses with his hand on the doorknob. He turns his head.

Lydia's still standing right where he left her, on her tiptoes against the wall. As soon as she realizes she's still in that position, she drops back onto her heels and crosses her arms. Jackson watches with something like a trace of regret in his gaze.

He doesn't apologize, exactly, but he opens the door and says, "Just don't make me late again, okay?" and it feels like there's an apology in that sentence but— she's thought that so many times before, and right now she thinks it might just be wishful thinking on her part.

Lydia rubs the goosebumps on her arms away and nods.

As soon as the door closes behind Jackson, Lydia turns to the wall. She knows Stiles is still listening, but it takes her a moment to gather herself before she speaks.

"It's not what you think," she tries. "Jackson's not like... _that_. He's never hurt me."

There's a long silence following her words. It's so long that Lydia starts to think that maybe he's not there after all— maybe he walked away because she told him to, and the thought of that alone makes her gut seize for reasons she doesn't want to examine— but then his voice sounds through the wall loud and clear.

"You sure about that?"

He's more perceptive than she ever gave him credit for.

She swipes at the tears pooling in her eyes with one angry hand because she hates that he somehow _knows_ her vulnerability despite her attempts to keep him far away from her. "Yes," she replies curtly.

"Okay," Stiles says meekly, but he doesn't sound quite like he believes her.

They're silent for a long moment, and then Lydia sighs, because as pissed as she's feeling she can't help but also feel a little reassured that he was there. Like someone was watching her back. "There were no Star Wars themed cupcakes, were there?"

"Nope," he replies, smacking the "p" sound off his lips. "I mean, they exist. I saw them in a food magazine at the dentist's office last week but anyway— I really _am_ out of flour, so, you know, if you have any, I actually need it."

"I don't," she says.

She's sure she can hear his jaw drop. "Who doesn't have _flour_?"

"People who don't cook?" she says.

"Oh my god." He sounds scandalized. "Are you one of those people that subsides off of ramen noodles? That shit is toxic, Lydia."

Lydia spares half a glance at the pile of to-go salad cartons sitting next to the garbage can. "Don't patronize me. I eat healthy."

"Right."

She smiles slightly and then an awkward silence falls. This has become a conversation far too long for Lydia's liking, and Stiles seems to realize that as well.

"Okay, I'll— uh— leave you alone now," he says cautiously. "I'm sure you have things to do."

"And I'm sure you have things to smash," Lydia shoots back, but funnily enough she doesn't feel all that irritated about it right now.

He lets out a nervous, high-pitched laugh. "Yeah. Sorry about that."

He offers no real explanation, and she offers no reply. She hears his footsteps creaking away, but then they stop again.

"Lydia?"

She makes a humming noise to let him know she's listening.

"Look, I know you don't need help," he says, and then stops like he's revising something in his head. "But if you ever need _anything_ , you've got me."

Touched despite herself, Lydia just nods mutely before realizing that he can't see it. His footsteps creak away.

—

From that day on, things are different. They start talking through their wall, and weirdly enough it becomes a regular thing. It starts because Lydia burned water.

Or rather, she was boiling water for pasta a few days after her fight with Jackson and all the water evaporated while she was listening to Allison gush on the phone about her boyfriend Scott— who Lydia realizes she's actually met when Allison sends her a picture of him; he's the barista at the local coffee shop— but before she could really think about it the bottom of the pot burned, and Stiles smelled it apparently because he banged on the wall like it was his business and asked if everything was okay.

Which led to them talking.

"So add maybe half a cup of pasta," Stiles is instructing through the wall.

Lydia stares at the box. "Half a cup," she repeats. It's a small, tiny looking amount. "What did you say you do in school again?"

"Die," Stiles replies. "Continuously. Painfully. But officially, I'm a political science major. I know how to do math though. Half a cup is enough. And you're…"

"I'm doing my Master's," she says while adding a whole heaping cup of pasta to her now successfully boiling new pot of water.

"Oh, I know," he says, and she gives the wall a weird look. "The walls are thin, okay? I hear you talking to your advisor, like, all the time."

"They are thin," Lydia agrees pointedly. "Which is why I hardly get any sleep nowadays."

"I'm _sorry_ ," Stiles stresses. He doesn't sound very sorry.

She bangs a lid on the pot and arches an eyebrow even though he can't see it. "Why is your apartment so noisy all the time? I'm pretty sure I heard _growling_ the other day."

He's quiet for a moment. "You want the truth?"

"Obviously."

"My best friend's a werewolf. Those noises you hear every once in a while are him or his werewolf friends ripping up all my goddamn furniture in a full moon-induced haze."

She snorts. "If you don't want to tell me, you could just say so."

"I could," he replies lightly, and that's that.

—

The pasta ends up overflowing out of the pot, and Stiles loses his shit laughing.

"You didn't _listen—_ "

"How was I supposed to know?" she demands, glaring at the pasta she's trying to cram back into the pot. "They were so tiny before." And now they're absolutely monstrous in size.

"I told you half a cup."

"And I was _hungry_ ," she retorts, a blush now flooding her cheeks. She'd honestly thought he was giving her instructions to make a small meal.

She can hear the stupid grin in his voice. "Well, good for you. You've got about a week's worth of dinner now."

"This isn't funny."

"Admit it. It kind of is."

It kind of is. "I'm not talking to you anymore," she announces, dumping the excess pasta into a new plate. Cooking is hard work.

"Oh, come on—" he launches into a long winded and insincere apology, and it suddenly occurs to Lydia that she could just invite him over to eat her extra pasta. Wouldn't that be the normal thing to do?

She looks down at herself. She's wearing her nightclothes, her hair is probably a mess, and she's not wearing an ounce of makeup.

So it's a no, then. After he finally leaves, still chuckling faintly from his kitchen, she decides it's for the best.

—

"So when are you gonna break up with dickface?" Stiles asks her casually one day, while they're playing an online game of chess together. Because apparently that's a thing they do now.

It takes her a moment to sort out who dickface is supposed to be. "And why would I break up with Jackson? Checkmate."

"Because he doesn't deserve you, maybe?" He sighs through the wall. "Okay, can we do best four games out of seven?"

She examines her fingernails. "First best two of three, then three of five, now this? I'm beginning to think you're just a sore loser."

He mutters something incoherent and angry-sounding.

"What was that?" Her computer notifies her that Stiles has left the virtual game room. She smiles inwardly and switches tabs back to her research.

"Whatever," Stiles says. "You still didn't answer my question."

She replies without any real heat, "Because it's none of your business."

That's another thing that terrifies her, though— it feels like it kind of _is._

 _—_

Scott shows up at Stiles' door in the middle of the night, groaning loudly.

He's still half wolfed out, and Stiles sighs at the blood all over his shirt. "I thought the wendigos agreed to leave us alone?"

Scott chooses to flop on Stiles' couch instead of answering the question. "Dude. I just need to crash here for a couple minutes," he mumbles. "Until I heal. You know I can't go home like this." Allison has recently moved in with Scott.

"It's not my fault you never told your girlfriend that you're a," Stiles lowers his voice because now he knows Lydia can hear everything in his apartment, "werewolf. Meanwhile, you and Liam and Isaac camping out in my apartment in the middle of the night is making my neighbours both suspicious and annoyed. Especially my hot neighbour. She's _super_ suspicious and annoyed." When Scott simply closes his eyes like he's falling asleep, Stiles hisses, "Are you catching my drift here, Scott?"

"We don't have anywhere else to go," Scott whispers back heatedly, momentarily opening his eyes. "Deaton knows about us, and he's okay with us being here. This is our only safe place when we get hurt."

Stiles scrubs a hand over his face, casting a glance at the wall that separates his and Lydia's apartments. "Yeah, well, maybe you should try barging into _Deaton's_ apartment when it's three a.m. then and see how long _that_ lasts."

Scott yawns, then winces at the wound oozing blood on his shoulder. One of his clawed hands comes up to press against the wound, and his sharp nails graze the couch, leaving behind marks. Stiles watches without blinking an eye; he doesn't really give a shit. All his furniture is falling apart at this point.

"Just stay quiet then," Stiles mutters. "Or you're gonna mess up the thing I have with Lydia."

Scott cracks an eye open. "Dude, no offense but you don't have a thing with her. She's got a boyfriend." Scott is usually cranky after near-death encounters, which is understandable, but still irritating.

"Not so loud," Stiles hisses, casting a glance at the wall. "Look, Scott, I'm _aware_ of that, thank you, but she doesn't hate me anymore. I actually talk to her now. A lot. And she's gonna stop talking to me if you guys keep barging into my apartment in the middle of the night and making noise. So. Stop."

Silence.

"Do we have a deal?" Stiles insists.

Scott releases a loud snore in response.

—

One day Stiles is fucking around on the internet while lounging during his break at work, and when he encounters some memes he knows Lydia would love (read: roll her eyes at while secretly enjoying), he crosses another boundary and emails them to her.

All she replies with is _How did you get my email_?

It's simple, of course. The university has a database of all the students, and Stiles _may_ have hacked into it. Not for this occasion specifically, but he's had to do it before, and so he simply logged back in with his trusty stolen administrator password to find Lydia's email.

He just replies back a winky face, though.

Having her email then escalates into having her phone number. _I'm getting tired of your one line emails cluttering up my inbox_ , she'd told him. _Here's my phone number_. Stiles tries not to read too much into that. He fails.

So he texts Lydia while she's in the lab, and she texts him while he's at work, and for some reason it never occurs to Stiles how weird it is that he's friends with someone who doesn't even know what he looks like.

At least, until Scott says one night while they're wandering around campus, "Don't you think it's kind of weird how you're friends with someone who doesn't even know what you look like?"

Stiles tsks while pocketing his phone. "No."

"Hmm," Scott makes a disbelieving noise and casts a glance behind them into the darkness shrouding the treeline. "I think we lost them."

"What, the wendigos?" Stiles' phone vibrates again and he whips it out excitedly to read Lydia's response.

" _Yes_ , the wendigos," Scott exclaims, and snatches Stiles' phone out of his hands.

"Hey!"

"Are you _serious_ right now?" Scott says, holding Stiles' phone out of reach. "We just ran for our lives like two minutes ago and you're just— texting?"

Stiles thinks about that sentence and then holds up a hand. "Okay, you're definitely making it sound worse than it is."

Scott shoves Stiles' phone back into his hands, shaking his head. "You're in deep, aren't you?" His voice changes as he regards Stiles, expression now dawning on slightly wondrous. "This isn't just a crush. Dude. You're in love with her."

There's a small silence.

"I mean," Stiles mutters, "That's what I've been _saying_." But somehow it feels different now, doesn't it? It feels different after Scott has acknowledged it. It feels like he's in too deep suddenly.

In too deep for a girl who has a boyfriend, is smart and fun to hang out with and gorgeous, and would never, _ever_ give Stiles Stilinski the time of day.

Scott is still staring at him, and the silence stretches on too long for Stiles' liking. He shakes his head, biting his lip nervously and pockets his phone. "We should get out of here. I don't want to see another set of those weird piranha-looking teeth for the next ten years. At least."

—

Lydia's in her apartment tonight with her (take-out) dinner balanced on her lap and her phone in her hand, pathetically waiting for Stiles to text back.

Her phone buzzes, and she drops her fork excitedly only to find that it's a text from Jackson. She feels a small glimmer of disappointment at seeing his name on the screen.

Lydia's not too sure what to think about that. More and more she's found herself feeling slightly emotionally detached from him, especially since their last fight, and suddenly the prospect of breaking up with him doesn't sound as scary or as hard as it used to. But it doesn't have anything to do with Stiles.

It _doesn't_.

She's interrupted from her thoughts when she hears Stiles' front door open. She's about to get up and ask him if he's seen her text when she realizes he's already talking to somebody.

"...and Yoda is _not_ the big furry one, Jesus, Scott, I feel embarrassed taking you anywhere." The door slams shut and Lydia registers the name of his friend— Scott. That's Allison's boyfriend's name. Could it be—

"Who cares if I haven't watched Star Wars?" is the grumpy reply, and _yep_ that's definitely Scott. She's only met him once outside of the coffee shop, when Allison introduced them, but she'd had no idea he was friends with her neighbour.

" _I_ do," Stiles insists, and she hears the telltale sound of his couch groaning miserably as it does when he flops onto it. "Do you know how many jokes have been wasted on you because you've never watched it? Several, Scott. A lot. _Many_. So we are going to watch it, right now, and I don't care what happens, we are going to finish at least the first one."

There's a loud sigh and then the couch groans again, presumably Scott having dropped onto the couch as well. A minute later Lydia hears the Star Wars theme play and she's just about to slip on her new noise-cancelling headphones (something she really _should_ have bought a long time ago) when—

The power goes out.

She simply blinks into the darkness for a moment, at least until she hears Stiles exclaim a curse so loud that it's probably audible around the whole block. Scott laughs gleefully, apparently overjoyed at the impromptu cancellation of plans.

Lydia walks over to her door and wrenches it open, poking her head into the hallway. The emergency lights are on, flashing, and the few neighbours that live around her are also looking around the hall as well.

"What happened?" One asks Lydia, as if she knows the answers.

"There's no storm outside," Lydia murmurs. "Why'd the power go?" Her neighbours shrug, and head for the stairs. Lydia walks back into her apartment. She's willing to wait it out. Her computer still has power. She can work on her paper in the meantime.

"Shit," she hears Stiles say from his apartment as she sits back down. "Scott. The power went." There's an uncharacteristically grave emphasis to his words.

"So?"

"So why do you think the power went when there's no storm and this has literally never happened before."

There's a long silence where Lydia can only assume they're staring at each other. And then Scott whispers, but loud enough that Lydia can hear him:

"They're _here_."

Stiles instantly adds in hushed tones, "They _followed_ us."

"Dude. We gotta get out of here. Warn Deaton."

"Dude—"

Stiles never gets to finish his sentence, because then Lydia hears a window smash, a loud sound cutting through the warm night air. She jumps at it, and then she hears some muffled yells and the unmistakeable sound of a fist hitting flesh. She stands, heart beating wildly, and listens to the sound of a quiet but ferocious scuffle on the other side of the wall. It's a fight between three. She hears the ding of a baseball bat hitting something, and grunts and— _slashing_ sounds?

It ends with a loud thump against the wall, like someone's been slammed against it. Dust falls from the ceiling at the force of it. Quiet again.

Lydia takes an involuntary step towards the wall, eyes wide in the darkness. Are they…?

" _Shit_ ," Stiles says again, except this time he sounds slightly out of breath. "There's gotta be more where that came from."

Lydia can't help it anymore. "Where _what_ came from?" she demands.

Silence. Then:

"Lydia?" Stiles says in disbelief and perhaps with a slight edge of panic to his voice. "Why are you still here?"

She's affronted. "I _live_ here."

"Well, get out!" he yells.

She raises her eyebrows at the wall. Stiles curses and lowers his voice but Lydia can still hear him— "get Lydia and take her downstairs, okay? Please?"

"I'm not going anywhere until you tell me what's going on," Lydia shouts. She gets no answer, and then a minute later there's a rapid knocking on her door.

It's Scott. The barista, indeed.

He looks a little worse for wear, to put it lightly. Even in the dim light of the emergency lighting she can see the rips on his collar, the blood splashed against his face. It makes her feel a little ill, and she takes an involuntary step back. "Oh my— we should call the police—"

He holds up his hands, looking innocent despite the blood and injuries on him. "It's _okay_ ," he tells her softly, and there's something so trustworthy about that voice that Lydia finds herself following him into the hall. "Just go evacuate the building with everyone else, okay?"

"Scott," Lydia whispers, feeling hysteria start to creep up on her as she casts a glance around, "Could someone please tell me what is going _on_?"

He opens his mouth to reply but never gets to answer because the roof of the hallway splinters suddenly and a dark blur— _someone—_ drops straight through it like a rock, landing right on top of Scott. Lydia shrieks, reeling backwards, and Scott grapples with the person on his shoulders for a moment before managing to fling them off and slam them against the wall.

She catches a glimpse of the attacker in the flickering emergency lights— his mouth opens in a snarl, he hisses, and Lydia is barely able to register the sight of sharp fangs— _dozens of them_ — before the attacker's hand shoots out, reaching for her.

Her mouth opens to scream, but then she's yanked back by something else, back into her own apartment.

 _That's_ when she screams— it's quickly muffled by a hand clapped against her mouth. She's pulled backwards, backed into the darkness all over again while outside Scott fights the thing she just saw.

"You okay?" The person behind her whispers, and she relaxes infinitesimally. It's—

" _Stiles_!" she all but shrieks at him when he removes his hand. He's still got one arm wrapped around her waist and she can't bring herself to ask him to move it because it feels so very solid against her. And when she turns her head, she can't see his face because it's still pitch black dark in here. Not that she would recognize his face. It's his voice she knows. "What _is_ that thing?"

"Uh," he replies. His chest is very solid to rest against, a fact that Lydia definitely does not file away obsessively. "A wendigo?"

"A wendigo," she repeats.

"Correct-O." He's being overly blase.

"A cannibal monster."

"Ten points to the little lady."

"Which is fictional," she says pointedly.

He sighs. "And we were doing so well." and Lydia's suddenly struck at how more clear his voice sounds when his mouth is an inch away from her ear instead of muffled by a wall or phone static. It's deep and raspy and crisp and rattles her to the core like she's just hearing it for the first time.

Something crashes in the hall, the emergency lights in the hallway cut out, and Lydia can't see through her own doorway anymore. Then there's the distinct sound of growling— unmistakeable, and wholly inhuman.

She suddenly remembers Stiles making a joke about _werewolves_ a long time ago.

Two glowing red eyes appear in front of her, and she lets out another shriek. Stiles' grip around her tightens, and he leans down.

"Hey, it's okay," Stiles says, all soothing, bent so close that his lips brush against the shell of her ear, and she shivers. "It's, um, Scott."

The glowing red eyes come closer, and Lydia, petrified, tries to back up. Stiles stands his ground, so she only manages to press her body tighter against him. "Is this some kind of prank?" she asks in a tight voice.

Stiles' fingers run sympathetically down her arm. "Fuck, no, Lydia," he says softly. "I wish it was."

She tries to steady her breathing as the red eyes approach. This close up the red light from his eyes make it possible for her to squint and make out _very_ inhuman features.

She feels her own breath hitch when she realizes she still recognizes Scott underneath.

Scott clears his throat when her eyes widen. "The wendigo's gone."

"Oh, goody," Stiles says. His voice is laden thick with sarcasm. "I'm sure that's all our problems wrapped up with a nice little bow."

Lydia suddenly pushes away from him, and he he makes a sound of surprise. Because his statement makes something else occur to her. "Are _you_ one too?" she accuses in a high pitched voice. "Are you a— a—" She's barely able to catch up with events as they come.

"Okay, _no_ ," he says.

She puts her hands on her hips and glares in his general direction despite the fact that she can barely make out his outline.

He's tall. Nice. Well built, if a little on the skinny side. That's about all she can see, since her eyes won't adjust anymore. "I'm human," he insists. "I promise."

"And you couldn't have _mentioned_ any of this to me? That I've been in danger living next to you this whole time?" Without waiting for an answer, she wheels around on Scott. "Does Allison know about this?"

Scott blinks. "I— No," he admits.

She throws her hands up. She's done with these two. She heads for the doorway.

"Where are you going?" Stiles asks exasperatedly.

"Outside," she says curtly. "With the rest of the tenants. Like you wanted me to, remember?" She feels around for the doorway blindly. Scott says very quietly, "a little to the left," and she moves and finds it, walking into the hall.

"Lydia," Stiles starts.

"Don't," she hisses, and then she's gone.

—

Scott finds her in the school library the next day, sliding into the seat across from her. She doesn't look up from her textbook, even when he clears his throat. Last night was a long one, between waiting outside the apartment building for hours for the lights to be put back on and the safety check deeming it clear for everyone to come back she'd gotten back in and spent the rest of the night looking up werewolf and wendigo mythology. She doesn't even know what happened in there during the time she was outside with the other tenants. But from the exhausted sound of Scott's voice when he speaks, she thinks there might have been more where that first wendigo came from.

"Please don't tell Allison," Scott finally says, clasping his hands pleadingly.

Her eyes stay rooted to the text.

"I want to tell her myself," he continues. "I just… haven't found the right time. It's kind of hard to find the right time to tell someone you care about that the supernatural is real, you know."

He says this in a way that's almost knowing, like he's not only talking about himself. Like he's talking about Stiles. Lydia snorts and slams her book shut, finally arching a brow at him.

"Fine," she says primly. "I won't tell Allison. You can take all the time you want." Scott breathes an exhalation of relief, but she's not done. "But I sincerely hope 'the right time' comes soon, Scott. Because maybe she won't be as lucky as me. Maybe she'll get hurt and she won't even know the reason is because she was close to you. Because she's close to you and you never even cared to tell her she was in danger." She picks up her books, scraping back her chair with a loud sound. "Think about _that_ , Scott." And she turns on the heel and walks away.

—

"Lydia," Stiles calls through his wall quietly.

Lydia flips the channel.

"Lydia," he sighs, and she can almost imagine him pressing his hands against his side of the wall, delivering a puppy dog look through it. Although she doesn't know what he looks like, so she really can't. "Please just talk to me."

Lydia munches on another forkful of salad.

"I'm sorry," he says softly. Her mouth pauses in munching before continuing. "Look, I would've told you but, I don't know, we've been living like this for so long that it feels like first instinct to keep it a secret."

A piece of lettuce drops off her fork and into her lap. She picks it up and pops it in her mouth.

He exhales again. "You're killing me here, Lydia."

She turns the volume of her TV up. But even that can't drown him out.

"Please." His voice cracks.

Lydia reaches for her noise-cancelling headphones, and if he says anything else that night, she doesn't know.

She still can't truly drown him out.

—

She doesn't talk to him anymore. He stops trying immediately after that first night, and that's the worst thing.

And in the middle of the night, when it's dark and nobody can see her insecurities, she can even admit to herself that it's _lonely_. It's lonely, even while she's having sex with Jackson on her bed and he's kissing her neck and thrusting so vigorously that the bedframe bangs against the wall.

She might have encouraged him to do that. Out of spite.

It's also out of spite that she starts moaning really loudly. Jackson, infuriatingly, seems to think it's about him— " _God_ , baby, that's so hot," he groans— when in reality there's just a very ugly part of her soul that wants Stiles to hear this.

To make him suffer.

Suffer, for what he's done to her, knowingly or unknowingly— that he made her care about him. He made her laugh, he made her really have to think (which is hard to make a genius do); he made her think about him even when he wasn't around, he made her _want_ him around. He had to have _made_ her do these things— she doesn't want to consider the alternative. That she did all those things by herself.

Because then it makes the fact that he hurt him worse. Because then she did _that_ to herself, too. She got close to someone who didn't feel all that close to her; or at least, not close enough to tell them a potentially life-saving piece of information.

She should have known that, she thinks. They've never even seen each other's faces. It was stupid of her to think that.

Jackson finally sags against Lydia, panting harshly. Lydia stares blankly at the ceiling.

—

"What happened with you and Stiles, anyway?" Allison asks her one day while they're shopping.

Lydia tries to appear unaffected by this question although she's caught off guard. "Nothing happened."

"You used to text him all the time," Allison points out.

Lydia's fingers tighten on the dress she's running her hand down, her fist bunching up the cloth. "I said, nothing."

"Oh," Allison says, all chipper. "Then you'll be happy if I bring Scott _and_ Stiles along to our next movie night, then."

Lydia turns her glare on Allison, who cocks her head expectantly. "I'm not talking to him anymore," she replies tightly. "It turns out he was hiding something from me. And I don't want to talk about it." Her voice is sharp and pointed.

Allison watches her for a moment before she makes a sympathetic noise and lays a hand on her arm. "I'm sorry, Lydia."

She shrugs like it's nothing. "Don't be. He's an idiot, anyway." _And Scott is hiding something from you too_ , she wants to add. But she bites her tongue.

—

She thought it couldn't get worse, this situation, but then one night Stiles brings someone home, too. It's definitely not Scott, that's for sure. But they're making a hell of a lot of noise.

The girl is moaning, panting loudly, saying Stiles' name. Stiles is mostly silent, which makes Lydia think that his mouth is otherwise occupied, which makes her start thinking about it, thinking about his voice rumbling against her own thigh, and then she realizes how pathetic she is, getting turned on as her neighbour tongue-fucks another woman.

She thinks Stiles is punishing her right back, the way she did to him. At least, until she hears him murmur, very very quietly— so quiet that she has to strain her ears to hear him—

"Not to ruin the mood, but can you be a little more quiet?" he whispers. "My walls are really thin, and my neighbours already hate me enough."

Lydia wishes that were true. The girl huffs.

—

"Did it work?" Scott asks abruptly the next day as Stiles drops into class beside him, the only class they share together, an elective.

"No," Stiles replies hollowly, staring at his hands instead of pulling out his notes. "God, Scott, you'd think I'd be able to get over her by now, but I _can't_. Most nights she's over there fucking her boyfriend and I'm lying in bed wondering if she likes those roll-y pastas or the filled ones better. And I'm aware," he adds, pointing a finger at Scott, "I'm _aware_ that sounds pathetic. And that's because… it is." He throws his hands up, then runs them over the back of his head.

"It's not pathetic," Scott says.

Stiles huffs, pulling a pencil out of his bag. "You told Allison about— you know— yet?"

"Tonight," Scott says firmly. "I'm gonna do it tonight."

"Great," Stiles says. "At least I won't be the only one with my love life in shambles after this."

"It's not gonna be like that." Scott gives him a look. "And by the way, I hope you know Lydia's mad at you because she cares about you—"

Stiles rolls his eyes. "Oh for the love of God, Scott, save the analysis for someone who thinks taking first year psych qualifies you as a therapist."

"No," Scott insists. "Look, you haven't talked to her like I have. You haven't even seen her except for when she comes into the shop to get coffee. _I_ have. Allison has. And Allison told me once that she thinks Lydia gets this _look_ on her face when I mention you."

Stiles finds himself intrigued despite himself. "Like what?"

Scott gestures helplessly. "Like— I don't know. Softer?"

"Softer," he repeats. "Wow. Helpful."

"I'm serious."

"I know. That's the sad thing."

Scott sighs. Just then, the professor walks in, announcing a pop quiz and effectively putting an end to the discussion.

—

That night turns out to be a bad one for Stiles instead of Scott.

The wendigos apparently just won't quit while they're ahead, because one moment Stiles is taking the shortcut route back home and the next he's being attacked by one.

It's pretty brutal.

The wendigo apparently isn't interested in finishing the job, because after Stiles hits the ground he bolts. And Stiles is left there against a tree, pressing a hand against the gushing wound in his stomach and trying his best not to panic. He fails.

He fumbles for his phone, fingers slippery with blood. "Scott—" he starts, but Scott butts in.

"Dude!" he says, all excited. "I told Allison. She's not pissed. Well, she was at first, but we talked it out. We're okay."

"That's great, Scott," Stiles says, injecting in sarcasm to hide the shake. "But I'm bleeding out in the woods behind the mall and I really think you should come get me."

A beat.

Then Scott swears. "The wendigos—"

"Who else?"

"True," Scott admits, mumbling, "Deaton said they'd try scare tactics," before saying louder, "We're coming to get you, buddy. Stay awake, okay? Just stay awake." There's an element of pleading in his voice.

"I'll— I'll try." His voice sounds very small.

"I'm serious," Scott says, and maybe his voice is shaking a bit too.

Stiles smiles tiredly even though his best friend can't see it. "I know. That's the sad thing."

Scott laughs, an empty one. "I gotta get off the phone now, okay? Stay awake."

Stiles nods and hangs up before realizing Scott wouldn't have been able to hear him.

And then he's alone, slumped against this tree fighting with his heavy eyelids and the terrified gallop of his thoughts as he stares into the darkness and the darkness of his own blood seeping into the grass around him.

He's scared.

His hand creeps back to his phone as if on it's own accord, hovering over Lydia's speed-dial. He doesn't think about the consequences. He doesn't think about how they haven't been talking. All he thinks about is hearing her voice, that it's the only thing he wants right now.

He calls.

"Hello?" her voice is slightly irritable, and with great effort he lifts the phone to his ear. "I've got a presentation tomorrow morning, Stiles. If you want something from me, make it quick."

It suddenly occurs to him how strange it is that she picked up the phone. And then he realizes he never tried to call after they stopped talking.

"No, nothing," Stiles mutters. He knows what presentation she's talking about; he's heard her speaking with her advisors over the phone about it for weeks. It's a big one, and really important to her. He doesn't want to fuck up her preparation time this close to the actual thing. "Uh, sorry." He lowers the phone, but then he hears her voice again, tinny in the speaker, calling his name. He brings it back to his ear.

"Stiles? Wait," she says.

He makes a humming noise to indicate he's heard.

There's a pause, and then she says, quietly and without a trace of irritation, "Why'd you call?"

"Kinda lonely," he mumbles, scrambling for an excuse.

"Oh, is your right hand not available tonight?"

He scoffs despite himself. There's a teasing lilt to her voice beneath the haughtiness. "It's not that. I just…" Another wave of tiredness goes over him and he sighs. "I just wanted to hear your voice."

Silence.

Some distant part of him realizes he might have just freaked her out, big-time. But the part of him that's present right now, the one that feels mysteriously floaty, is just… calm, now that he's listening to her talk. "About your presentation," he continues, squeezing his eyes shut and opening them again in an attempt to stop them from falling closed of their own accord. "You need to run it through with someone?"

"My presentation?" Lydia sounds caught off guard. "Stiles, where are you right now?"

"Just walking," he lies easily. "Tell me about your presentation."

She's quiet again. Probably confused. The more silent she is the more he starts to feel the fear creeping up on him once more.

" _Please_ ," he whispers fervently. "Please talk about it. Just for a minute."

"Are you alright?" she asks slowly.

He sighs, exasperated despite his situation. "I will be if you _talk_ , for the love of God, Lydia."

A beat.

"So I was thinking," she says, "that I'd start with a graphic, you know, just to ease the audience into it." He smiles and tips his head back, nudging his phone into the crook between his neck and shoulder so he doesn't have to hold it up anymore.

"Yeah. Good idea."

"And then I'm going to present the materials and methods section…" He closes his eyes at her voice as it washes over him.

She gives him the run-down of her presentation, and he's gotten lost in it, so lost that he's wrenched out of it when she clears her throat a few minutes later.

"Stiles?"

"Hmm."

"Is that good enough?" she asks in a quiet voice. His eyes open. "I have to get back to work."

And it hits him then— Stiles realizes she's doing him a _favour_ , talking about her presentation. She doesn't need to run through it— she probably knows it like the back of her hand by now. She did that— she did that for _him_. Without explanation, without question. Even after what had happened between them.

Stiles feels like crying. He loves her too much.

"Yeah," he hears himself say, swallowing back his tears. "Thanks, Lydia. I just… really needed to hear you talk."

"You said that already." He nods. "Are you sure you're okay?"

He doesn't feel like answering that question again, so he ends the call, then lets the phone drop into the puddle of blood surrounding him. Scott should be here… any minute now…

Any minute… Scott…

His last thought is just, _Lydia_.

—

She calls him a few hours after he wakes up in hospital.

"Uh," he says when he picks up, "Sorry about being weird last night, um, I was high—"

"That's what I thought!" she shrieks at him, and he has to hold the thing away from his ear. "At least until Scott had the common decency to tell me you were in the hospital!"

He winces. "Yeah. About that. Wendigos strike again."

His attempt at humour falls flat. "You were bleeding out and you called me to ask me about my _research—_ " She sounds like he's marvelling at his stupidity, which irks him.

"What was I _supposed_ to say?" he hisses back. "'Oh, by the way Lydia, I know you're preparing for a life-changing presentation tomorrow, and I know you hate me, but—"

"I don't hate you," she says at once, so fast that he thinks it was instinctive. A beat where he registers that, and then she goes on hurriedly, "And I don't care what I've got the next day, if you're hurt you should tell me."

"I guess I have a problem telling people important things," Stiles replies without thinking, and after an awkward pause they both laugh weakly, sheepishly, and it's like weeks of tension between them are melting away.

"You're right about that."

"Sooo…" he drawls, feeling lighter suddenly. "How'd your presentation go?"

"You've got a lot of _gall_ , Stiles Stilinski—" he scoffs and she changes topic— "Maybe I should drop by the hospital, if only to slap some sense into you."

"You can't do that," he says, aghast. "I'm not ready for you to see me for the first time." He hasn't even got _gel_ in his hair for God's sake.

"Who says _I_ am?" she retorts.

"You always look beautiful, though," he says without thinking.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"I _heard_ you," she insists. Stiles bites his fingernails while she comes to the inevitable conclusion. "Stiles, do you know what I look like?" There's a warning in her voice, and Stiles gulps.

"Maybe…"

"You've _seen_ me?" she says incredulously. "And you never talked to me?"

"Okay," he says nervously. "This sounds bad, but—"

"You really _do_ have a problem telling people things, don't you?"

"You're catching me at a bad time—"

She hangs up. He sighs.

—

"Don't be mad at him," Allison tells her. They're at the archery range, where Allison is attempting to show her how to shoot.

"Why shouldn't I be?" she hisses at her friend. "All he does is keep things from me."

"It's for a good reason," Allison replies, and Lydia knows she's talking about Scott too. "Maybe he's being stupid, but he's got good intentions. He cares about you." Lydia shakes her head, silently fuming. "I'm just saying, you're allowed to be mad at him, but don't push a good thing away from your life."

Lydia huffs. A good thing. Yeah, right. All he is to her is heartache. She draws back her bow and exhales slowly, squinting at the target.

"And by the way," Allison adds slyly, "Stiles is _really_ cute." Lydia shoots at the same time, missing the target by a mile. Allison laughs.

Lydia spends a lot of time later thinking about Allison's advice, though.

—

Stiles is cleared to go home, and he finds that things are _different_ once again.

They start talking through their wall again, tentatively. After Stiles apologizes profusely, more of the same he did before. But this time Lydia seems more willing to listen.

"I can come over right now if you want to see what I look like," Stiles offers one day.

"Hmm," she says, and he can just imagine her tossing her head back and looking at the ceiling in mock contemplation. "Not today."

She just enjoys holding it over his head, he thinks, and shakes his head with a smile.

—

Lydia breaks up with Jackson.

Stiles knows because he hears her sniffling away in her bedroom, and he's pretty capable of connecting that with the loud shouting match she and Jackson had in the coffee shop that morning while Stiles was peeking around the kitchen wall.

After a few hours he can't bear listening to her suffer alone in silence, so he knocks on the wall.

"Go away," she says, voice muffled into her pillow presumably. "I don't need anyone hearing me cry."

"Shit, you're crying?" He can almost see her raised eyebrows. "Uh— Just kidding. Yeah, it's kind of obvious." He coughs. "What happened?"

He almost doesn't think she's going to tell him, but then she says quietly, "I broke up with Jackson."

"Oh," he exclaims at the confirmation, jubilant. But then he can pretty much feel her glare through the wall they're talking through, so he hastily adopts a far more sober tone. "I mean, _oh_. So sorry for your loss. My condolences. Uh— rest in peace, Jackson."

"He's not dead," she snaps.

"He's not? I thought you would've ripped him to shreds."

She huffs a watery laugh and he hears her blow her nose. "You're not helping."

"Sorry," he says sincerely. She sniffles. His next words are completely unfiltered and unthinking. "I bet you look beautiful when you cry."

"Are you… flirting with me? Right after I broke up with my boyfriend?" She sounds more like herself suddenly, and he thinks that's a victory.

"Uh, no?" he says, suddenly not sure what the correct answer to that question is.

There's quiet for another moment, and he turns to walk away from the wall before he can fuck up even more. But then she speaks up again.

"I didn't _feel_ anything for Jackson anymore, Stiles," she murmurs. "I just woke up today and I… I felt like it should be over." She sniffles. "He didn't even do anything bad today. He was _nice_ this morning, and I broke up with him. Does that make me a bad person?"

Stiles takes a moment to marvel at the fact that she's opening up to him this much before mulling over her question seriously. "No," he decides. "There's no way you're a bad person."

"How would you know?" She laughs; a sad, broken sounding thing. "I'm not even _nice_ to you."

"You're nice when it counts," Stiles replies. Like when he's bleeding out in the woods. Like when he feels lonely and scared and can't find it in himself to explain why he _needs_ her so much, and she's still there.

He thinks maybe she's thinking about the same thing. "Thanks, Stiles," she says quietly.

He frowns. "For what?"

Her answer is nearly inaudible. "For making me feel human."

Stiles swallows past the lump in his throat her heartfelt statement creates. "That's my job," he attempts to joke. "In a pack full of supernatural creatures, you know, you've gotta have someone grounding them. Like a lightning rod."

"A lightning rod," Lydia repeats, sounding amused. "Well, you're good at it." Stiles grins dazedly. This is almost too much Nice Lydia for him to handle. "Except you're absolutely _moronic_ when it comes to simple communication," she adds.

He grins wider. That's more like it.

—

And then there's the night it changes _again_.

It's a long time later and according to Stiles the pack of wendigos has finally cleared out so all's well— They're just talking through the wall, and Stiles has somehow convinced her to watch a New York Mets game on her TV, so they're watching together and she's making commentary that makes him snort and then say, "This is serious, Lydia."

"I am just _saying_ ," she insists. "These colours clash hideously. Whoever designed those uniforms should be fired."

And it goes like that, them bickering back and forth, until the thought crosses through Lydia's mind that she might love him.

Strangely, it doesn't scare her as much as it should. "Stiles?" she says.

He pauses in munching on something. "Yeah?"

"You can come over, if you want," she offers. "We could watch the game together."

He's silent for a long moment. Then: "I'm in my pajamas."

She snorts. "Like I care. Come over."

He resumes munching. "Maybe later," he says offhandedly, and she feels her heart sink. He doesn't— he doesn't want to see her. And it sends a bolt of insecurity through her. She stands abruptly.

He seems to sense that something's wrong. "Lydia?"

"I just remembered," she says, in the back of her mind noting that her voice sounds oddly high-pitched, "I have some assignments to mark."

"Lydia—" But she turns off her TV and reaches for her noise-cancelling headphones.

—

The next morning she heads out for a coffee at the place she's become a regular at. She hadn't been able to sleep much last night.

Lydia Martin knows she's pretty and smart. But she's also distant, cold, standoffish and according to Jackson as well as a lot of people— she can really be a _bitch_. The fact that Stiles didn't want to see her last night just brought those insecurities back to the front of her mind. She'd been tossing and turning for hours.

Scott gives her a sympathetic smile when she orders her usual. "Rough night?" he asks.

She shrugs noncommittally and gives him a small smile back. Allison knows about the supernatural now, and so Lydia's good with Scott now. Allison _also_ knows about Lydia's stupid feelings for Stiles, and looking at Scott's soft smile, Lydia has to wonder if she told Scott about them.

Lydia moves out of line, waiting for her drink, and it's placed there with a cardboard box with a delicious sweet smell wafting from it. She picks up her drink and turns to leave, but Scott says, "Wait."

She turns. He points at the box. "These are for you. Compliments from the chef." There's a goofy grin growing on his face now.

Lydia arches a brow and reaches for the box's lid. Upon opening it, she sees three little cupcakes, coated thickly in black icing made to look speckled like the night sky— and on top of each is stuck a small figurine of Yoda.

She simply stares blankly in confusion for a moment, and then it comes to her.

 _Star wars themed cupcakes._

Feeling suddenly as if she's dreaming, she looks up dazedly. She looks past Scott, and sees the cute baker she always sees in the back smirking lopsidedly and waving at her.

" _Stiles_?" she manages. That's the only word in her vocabulary at the moment.

He grins widely, and dusts his hands off from flour, practically prancing over the front counter. His hair is standing up wildly, and she drinks him in, his molten brown eyes, his sharp cheekbones, his broad shoulders, the way he leans on strong forearms over the counter to watch her reaction.

"Hi, Lydia," Stiles Stilinski says softly, to her face for the first time. It hits her all at once. It's _him_.

And then:

Oh god. Allison was wrong. He's not just cute. He's _hot_.

And then:

"So let me get this straight," she says slowly, holding up a slightly shaking hand. "You've been working here this _whole time_?"

His smile fades slightly.

Scott coughs in the background. "Well, that's my cue to get back to work." He saunters away, leaving Stiles and Lydia staring at each other.

"Okay, _wait_ ," Stiles starts as Lydia glares, and then he's scrambling for something to say, she can tell. But then he stops and sighs. "Yeah, you're right. I don't really have an excuse. But hey!" he exclaims brightly, shoving the carton of cupcakes at her. "I've been planning these for a week. Fondant Yoda's are a bitch to make, as it turns out."

She looks back down at the cupcakes— so they're fondant, not plastic. Oh. She looks back up. He's staring at her anxiously, biting his full bottom lip which is extremely distracting but despite that it all clicks anyway, the reason he didn't want to see her last night. He wanted to _surprise_ her with this. She shakes her head.

"I should be mad at you right now."

"You should," Stiles agrees. "I wouldn't be surprised if you threw one of these cupcakes at my face. Don't do that, please, by the way. They literally took forever."

She fights down a smile at his nervous blabbering, trying to remain her cross expression. But her amusement bleeds through her words. "You're a moron," she says fondly. "Don't keep things from me anymore."

"I won't even take a piss without you knowing about it," Stiles vows.

She can't stop the smile from splitting across her face right then, and his eyes grow even softer at the sight of it. The way he looks at her makes her feel a little shy, and she glances away.

His finger taps on her chin. She startles at the contact, and looks up. Now he looks nervous.

"I, um, really like you," he says.

Her heart swells. She plays cool. "Do you?"

"Way too much," he replies, voice cracking slightly. He licks his lips. "So I was wondering if you'd want to maybe go on a date with me sometime—" he says this so fast she almost doesn't understand it— "and you can say no if you want, you can reject me brutally and still walk away with these amazing cupcakes by the way, but I'm just saying, the invitation is out there—"

She cuts him off by pressing her lips to his.

His lips are soft, and he melts into it immediately, the fingers on her chin moving to cup her cheek, and she's tilting her head, and then they're kissing deeply across the service counter with people all around them.

It registers that she's touching Stiles for the first time— like _this—_ and it makes her feel heady. She wants to touch him more. So she reaches forward and slides one hand to the back of his head, through his impossibly soft hair, and the other to his cheek.

It's everything she could have dreamed of and more; but at the same time, it feels insignificant. She's technically meeting him for the first time, but it doesn't really feel that way. In the end, it doesn't matter to Lydia what Stiles looks like (he's attractive), or what he feels like under her fingers (soft and warm and firm all at once), or how well he kisses her (well enough to make her toes curl in her shoes). What matters is simply that it's Stiles. That he can make her thaw and laugh and be beautifully vulnerable and altogether human with him. She doesn't have to see his face for him to do that.

But it's certainly nice, she thinks when they break apart.

Stiles' lips are red and a little swollen from her kiss, and he's staring at her dazedly. The sounds from the cafe rush back into Lydia's ears, and she realizes she probably looks exactly the same.

"Yes," Lydia says, clearing her throat and straightening up. "Yes, I'll go out with you."

Stiles nods slowly, digesting this, and picks up one of the cupcakes from the box, taking a bite absentmindedly. "Wow," he says to no one in particular, and his oh-so-familiar voice is raspier than she's used to.

"You talking about the cupcakes, or me?" Lydia can't help but ask, a teasing lilt to her voice.

He pauses mid-chew, one cheek ballooned out from the food, and arches his brows. "Both." He gestures at his cupcakes. "Damn, this is good."

"Humble," Lydia snorts.

"I can't believe you made Yoda cupcakes," Scott muses as he passes them on the way to the coffeemaker. "Could you be any further up his ass?"

Stiles plucks the fondant Yoda from the top of the cupcake and rips his head off with his teeth in one bite. He adopts the voice of the character as he looks at the decapitated figurine fondly. "Up Yoda's ass, I happen to like being." He casts a glance at Lydia. "You wanna get out of here?"

She'd like nothing better. "You're at work," Lydia points out. "And I have to _go_ to work."

He sighs exaggeratedly and puts down the cupcake. "Fine."

They stare at each other for another moment.

"I'm gonna kiss you again," Stiles breathes. "Is that okay?"

She gets in a nod before he does, and this time it's just a very domestic feeling sort of peck. She has a feeling Stiles is restraining himself. She can't blame him because she's doing the same. They really shouldn't be doing this in a coffee shop for god's sake.

And she's going to be late for work.

So Lydia picks up her drink again and starts backing away. "Later, then."

Stiles nods slowly as he registers that. "Yeah," He murmurs. "Yeah, uh, I'll text you." They hold gazes a moment longer before Lydia breaks it to turn to the door and push it open.

The door chimes, as Lydia walks out. She turns one last time to see him still standing there, leaning against the counter with his chin propped up into his hand. "Bye, Lydia," he says, and although he's quiet she can still hear him over all the hubbub of the shop.

She replies, "I'll see you later."

—

(For the first time ever— she _will_.)

* * *

 **A/N:**

 **Well, I hope that was somewhat coherent. I wrote most of it in one night, so I wouldn't be surprised if it wasn't lol.**

 **Anyways, I'm not gonna say that I live off of feedback and getting new reviews literally makes my day, but… I live off of feedback and getting new reviews literally makes my day.**

 **wellsjahasghost on tumblr :)**


End file.
